My parents told me I would grind them in my sleep as a kid. I had braces removed about 7 years ago. After I got my retainers, you wear them all the time at first and then reduce the time slowly. I got lazy about paying attention when I hit the 6 hour mark and just started wearing them at night. I could feel some shifting in general, but visibly there was a tooth on the bottom that would shift back and forth from day to night. After a few years of ignoring I finally decided this probably wasn't good and made a trip back to the orthodontist a few weeks ago.
He said the little bit of shifting wasn't horrible, but couldn't tell me what it would do years from now. While I was there he pointed out, my bottom teeth being really flat from grinding. He mentioned it wasn't good for someone my age and said he would expect that type of wear for someone in their 60s. Great. On the bright side I have longer bottom teeth. For some reason we didn't talk much else about it. I made the decision to go back to wearing my retainers full time and reduce wear slowly.
Since then I've noticed before I fall asleep it seems quite natural and comfortable to tighten my jaw. I wake up in the morning with my jaw clenched. I mean clenched. I have to make a point to stop and pay attention. I've also noticed that my one front tooth and the one beside that is filed down a bit (uneven) and I'm having a total fit. You can't get it back once it's gone!
If I look at the top of my bottom retainer I can actually see teeth marks in the acrylic from my uppers.
I talked with my dentist about the teeth shifting thing (called him first he recommended seeing my ortho) and he said the next time I'm in he can check the bone density or whatever. I was just at the dentist a week before we had this conversation. The dentist I normally see was out.
I did call the orthodontist back with some other questions (before I noticed anything with my upper teeth) and they mentioned they could make a night bite guard or my dentist could. I'll be calling both tomorrow. We have dental insurance but I don't know if this will be covered.
We have a (new) sports mouth guard here and I considered wearing that in meantime but quickly saw that is NOT a good idea at all due to the size.
I don't think I'm going to be able to wear my retainers at night and a mouth guard so I'm going to have to flip the wear time and wear the retainers during the day. - When I get to that point. I'm not even close to being there yet. I've been leaving them out about an hour. (note - the goal is to only have to wear the retainers once a month or so.)
It's probably worse to wear the retainer right now actually. That sucks because I just got done wearing them for weeks, (let's not forget they're so pretty and comfortable) and it will undo at least some of what I did.
On the bright side I don't have any headaches or jaw pain. I read it can be from stress and I thought how I don't have any. However, something has went down recently that is indirectly affecting me. I'm upset about it. I don't dwell on it all the time but it's there. So I'd pick that if we're going to blame stress. Since my bottom teeth were already wearing away that can't be all of it, but my uppers weren't in this condition!
Thought about ordering this. (link) The updated version with the blue seems to have good reviews. Looks like it fits on the bottom and keeps the teeth from touching.
I know there are bigger things in life, but you need teeth to chew, I paid and went through the process to fix them and would like them straight and not all chipped up. I hear dental work, even with insurance, is quite expensive!
Think I'm taking the retainers out tonight. :(
Recommendations are welcome!
Thanks for listening.
Here is a link that might be useful: Den Tek
This post was edited by sheesharee on Thu, Sep 11, 14 at 2:31
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